Paralympics: Mary Fisher wins gold - 'it's all for them'

Kiwi Paralympian Mary Fisher is dedicating her gold medal victory to every New Zealander and all her supporters.

Fisher smashed her competitors in the Women's 100m Backstroke S11 to win New Zealand's second gold medal of the Rio Games in a world record time of 1:17.96 ahead of Liwen Cai (China) and Maja Reichard (Sweden).

"I am the one person in the lane, but it feels like every Kiwi and all the people around the world who have been supporting me and the New Zealand Team are there too - it's all for them," she said.

"The last 25m wasn't very pretty of my race but we made it in the end!"

Fisher was dominant from the beginning and led in the 50m mark, but it was after the split that she tore away from the rivals, winning by over two seconds.

"When you come to the pool deck and you're being announced into a final and tonight, to be in lane 4 because I had set the fastest time this morning - it's such a special feeling, that you can't describe in words," she said.

"You've got this big venue with 15,500 people and they are all going nuts, so the noise factor is amazing and you can feel the reverberations of how big the place is - it feels like you have this huge current swimming behind you."

The crowd leapt to their feet with a huge roar when she touched the wall.

Fisher has four more events to compete in Rio and is currently ranked top 3 in the world in five Paralympic events.